2-Minute Pep Talks

 

Blurb:

Feel Full of Hope, Love, and Comfort in Just 2 Minutes a Day
Imagine waking up every morning, feeling comfortable in your skin. Imagine loving yourself enough to ask life for no less than what you truly want. Imagine refusing to quit — and tackling every day with the endless optimism most adults believe is reserved only for children.
What if you could begin every day fully believing you are ready to take on the world? Better yet, what if it only took 2 minutes to start your day like that? That's what 2-Minute Pep Talks is for.
In this collection of 67 jolts of inspiration, celebrated writer Niklas Göke shares some of his favorite pieces, reworked ideas, and never-before-seen material, all to help you handle life's increasing complexity with grace, enthusiasm, and compassion.
You'll learn...
· Why our missteps are sometimes our best ones
· How to work with your brain rather than against it
· Why perseverance is more than just stubbornness
· How to express yourself more honestly
· Why you don't need more friends
· How to stop flinching when the phone rings
· What to do when you don't feel valued
...and a lot more! With more than two months of daily inspiration across five categories, 2-Minute Pep Talks will be your daily pick-me-up, a new perspective providing additional fuel to accomplish your dreams.
Whether you're looking for the silver lining in a world that seems to get messier by the day, novel ideas to stretch your brain, or that extra spring in your step — if you’re ready to regain that light, energetic, hopeful feeling we all used to possess as children, this book is for you.

Thoughts:

I knew of Göke from his Four Minute Books newsletter. So, I was quite interested in reading his books. To my utter surprise and delight, he very kindly sent me a copy of 2-Minute Pep Talks.
It has so many interesting stories/ideas/concepts. I have come across many of them elsewhere. Then what makes this book worth reading?
Well, I read many self-help books, some of which seemed patronizing, critical, and ableist to me. 2-Minute Pep Talks is certainly not one of them.
Göke's writing comes across as thoughtful, warm, and concerned about your life. It is simple yet soothing and conversational but insightful.
The book is laid out in short sections, which means that even people with a limited attention span can enjoy it. You can read the whole book from the front to the back (which is what I did) in one go or start anywhere and read one or two chapters at a time.
No matter what you do, the book has uplifting content that motivates you. It also has a practical side to it as it gives you actionable advice, tools, and resources to follow it up.
To sum up, a good, well-intentioned, easily digestible book.

The following are some of my notes/highlights from it. Some are verbatim, and some are paraphrased or rewritten. If any of these make you curious or resonate with you, do read the book.

• A $100 bill is still worth its full value no matter how crumpled it is.
• The story of Buddha and the muddy water.
• The story behind the funding of one of the longest-running children’s TV shows of all time, Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood.
• Charles Proteus Steinmetz sending an invoice for $10,000 to Henry Ford.
• Time billionaires are far wealthier than their older, financially richer peers.
• Whenever you can, choose to get paid to learn instead of idling to earn.
• Be a “jack of all trades, master of junctions.”
• Don’t 80/20 Your Dream: If you use the 80/ 20 rule on everything, you’ll live an unsatisfying life.
• Sharing your art is a privilege. An act of service. The honors should be attached to your name, and so should the fallout. That’s how you learn. (Apropos outsourcing/ghostwriting)
• Relationships are like trains.
• “Just” is the most dangerous word in the English language.
• “Jab sab galat ho raha ho, tab sab sahi ho raha hai.” When everything goes wrong, perhaps it’s setting itself right.” (Pleasantly surprised to see a Hindi saying in the book!)
• The Chapter 'The Isms That Ruin Your Judgement' – the whole chapter, especially in today's world.
• The French scientist Pierre Fouquet's categorization of alcoholism.
• Your phone should be like your toothbrush.
• If you can’t beat the fear, just do it scared.
• The story of four monks who decided to meditate in silence.
• A magnificent contradiction: Someone will save you today. …However, when it comes to the big things in life, no one will come and save you. You must be your own light. No one will make you rich, happy, healthy, or fulfilled. Those torches only you can carry. At the same time, you are constantly being saved.
• You can still forgive yourself — one more time.
• If you’re not valued, you’re in the wrong place.
• It’s never too late to try something new. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
• You can do anything. Don’t forget.
• Life is about taking chances.
• One thought. One thought can change everything.
• Now would be a great time to give up. But what if you don’t?
• Tomorrow can be a good day.
• You are the one we need.

365 Ways to Have a Good Day

 

Blurb:

SET YOUR MINDSET FOR SUCCESS

How are the next twelve months looking for you? Pretty much the same as last year? Or are you ready to make things interesting?

365 WAYS TO HAVE A GOOD DAY is a full year's worth of daily inspiration, tools, habits, actions and rituals that will set you on the path to personal success. You'll encounter surprising insights and odd experiments from the world of cutting-edge psychology. You'll discover the benefits of Feierabends and Laughies, have your eyes opened by a dance psychologist, and learn why one senior executive's tattooed fingers help him make the right career choices. You'll find stories to inspire you to even greater achievements, pick up habit-forming strategies from unexpected sources, get prompts to help you put ideas into action, explore brain hacks and uncover tips for lasting behavior change.

You'll meet a cast of characters from around the world who know all about creating success, from the founder of a billion-dollar mindfulness company in California to the Hollywood screenwriter who takes up to eight showers a day to fuel his ideas, and from the Harvard Business School professor who discovered more joy at work by wearing red trainers to the man who every Friday for five years set up a table in central NYC to give advice to strangers, including a gang member on the run.

365 WAYS TO HAVE A GOOD DAY focuses on the small stuff you can do every day to make life better. Because when you get the little things right, the big things follow. Things like figuring out where you're going, hitting reset, designing the life you want, breaking through limiting beliefs, and creating success on your own terms. And when you find what works for you, you can do more of it, making you more productive, more fulfilled, and much happier.

Use this book to help you seize the day - all 365 of them. The next twelve months could be the best days of your life.

Thoughts:

In this book, Ian Sanders gives you 365 actionable tips in clear, concise language. Aimed at making your day better, they range from being extremely specific to wild and fantastic. Some of them fall under familiar categories, such as personal development, but some other concepts, such as susegad, feierabend, keyifli, arbejdsglaede, fernweh, sobremesas, and fikabreak may be new to you.

The tips may not all be relevant to you. However, you will be able to understand the essence of what Sanders is trying to convey and customize them to suit your situation.

Being an incurable optimist, I believe that we can try to make any day a good day even when things seem hopelessly out of our control. I believe that reflecting upon your circumstances and changing your perspective can bring about major changes in your life. So, I like the book's premise.

Sanders weaves in anecdotes of his experiences engagingly to expound it. He mentions many interesting people, books, and other resources, which I intend to explore later.

I read it in one go. The chapters have numbers and not dates, which means you can start reading it any day. You can refer to a tip or two as and when needed.

Overall, an enjoyable book that has practical and unique tips for improving your life. It does exactly what the blurb says. It delivers on all accounts.

Note:

NetGalley provided me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Creating Clarity & Connection

 

Blurb:

Reimagine Your Life in a Positive and Purposeful Way.

Creating Clarity & Connection provides life-affirming practices to bring meaning to your self-discovery journey. Whether you are just starting, restarting, or reviving your efforts to reconsider your life, you can:

• Rediscover the things that make you happy,
• Reclaim your sense of wholeness,
• Reframe your life with a sense of purpose and perspective,
• Remake your life in a positive and purposeful way.

Creating Clarity & Connection provides direction to begin pursuing your best life, the life you know is waiting for you. No getting lost, sidetracked, or hijacked.

The self-guided journal pages offer guidance to help you understand:

Where to start?

• Happiness. Happiness is the key to shifting your perspective. Learn how to use Happiness Habits to infuse your life with simple moments that make you happy.
• Start with the end in mind. Before you begin your journey, develop the insight and clarity you need to define what you truly want for your life.
• Create an internal compass, a compass of your heart, to guide you as you navigate life in the direction of your dreams.
• Define the directions in life that are most important to you. The directions hold the key to your wellbeing and connect you with your unique talents and gifts.

How to make lasting forward progress?

• Notice and become aware of life around you. Deliberately and intentionally break free from existing intellectual routines. You can’t be open to what you can’t see.
• Experience the value of stillness. Cultivate your ability to connect with your heart and listen to the still small voice within you. The ability to hear in the stillness takes practice.
• Take action. Become deeply immersed and engaged in life by trying new things that will expand the realm of your experiences. These purposeful actions nurture your inherent curiosity., create intentions, and invite results.

Then what?

Let your life speak. By starting happy and starting small, you create the mindset and perceptive needed to work your way toward the life of your dreams. Your life will continue to unfold with each action you take.

How this approach was developed

The life-affirming practices outlined in Creating Clarity & Connection came from the experience of someone who was lost. Someone who thought, despite years of trying, she would never find meaning or contentment in life. Someone who lived in fear that she would die without having found her authentic self or lived a purposeful life. That someone is me.

I developed the self-guided journal pages as a way of capturing the process of what happened when I stopped judging and comparing and started noticing. How, when I summoned the courage to be curious, when I took direct and purposeful action in my life, I was led to the place I need to be.

What makes this self-guided journal unique?

• It’s all about you. It helps you unlock and understand the potential you already possess, helping you create your own way.
• It’s filled with thought-provoking wayfinding quotes. The quotes help you stay focused on what is possible in life. They feed your dreams.
• It is customizable. This is not a one-and-done solution. Rather, it is an approach you can use, refine, and redefine as you learn more about yourself and your life.
• You can travel at a pace that works for you. There are no daily or weekly requirements or regimens to follow. Use the journal at a pace that works for you.

Start right here, right now to create the clarity to connect with your life.

Thoughts:

Positives:

This is an open-ended journal. You are meant to use it to tackle feelings of despair by being self-aware and true to yourself. The author Robin Shukle discusses daily occurrences or ‘crumbs’, which if you pay attention, would direct you in your journey to find meaning and happiness.

The book is easy to read and has many quotes. It also comes with a list of resources and worksheets you can use in your transformational process.

Negatives:

This is from the blurb: “The life-affirming practices outlined in Creating Clarity & Connection came from the experience of someone who was lost. Someone who thought, despite years of trying, she would never find meaning or contentment in life. Someone who lived in fear that she would die without having found her authentic self or lived a purposeful life. That someone is me.”

However, nowhere in the book did I find what her personal/professional struggles were or why she felt stuck and wanted ‘more’.

Without personal anecdotes, the book seemed like a rambling account of things privy to the author and those close to her. I felt that the whole book could be condensed into one long blog post. I could not connect with the book, despite it having quite a few good points.

Note: I received an advance review copy from BookSirens in exchange for an honest review.

Tell Her She Can't

Blurb:

Who says you can’t?

Tell Her She Can’t is the manifesto for every woman who has been told she isn’t strong enough, smart enough, or capable enough to excel—and the motivational anthem for those who have succeeded despite doubt. Your vision of change is possible, with the right guides to light your way.

Entrepreneur Kelly Lewis shares the true stories of 35 inspirational women who overcame the naysayers to achieve “impossible” dreams. Learn from trailblazers who tackled outdated typecasts in Hollywood and champions who advocate for greater representation of Indigenous cultures.

Tell Her She Can’t is packed with motivational stories of adventurers, changemakers, and prevailers who have taken on the world to become pioneers in their fields or challenged gender stereotypes to build million-dollar businesses.

These inspiring women transformed adversity into a springboard for empowerment and success—and you can too.

You’ll discover:

• How to reframe life’s challenges into unique opportunities with Tools to Triumph.

• Key strategies to boldly turn negativity into resilient fuel and break boundaries holding you back.

• Why others say you can’t—and what they really mean when they do.

• A celebration of defiance, resilience and feminine strength.

• Inspiration from women at all stages of life who prove that nothing is off-limits.

A powerhouse guide for every modern woman and girl, Tell Her She Can’t invites you to blast past the gatekeepers of “can’t” and become unstoppable.

Thoughts:

This book is a non-fiction anthology of 35 stories of women who were told they can’t accomplish what they wanted but proved otherwise in style. The stories are not uniform in length or tone but are bound together in various sections by the common attitude/characteristic/ability of the women they feature.

In between these stories, Lewis shares her insight on the particular attitude/characteristic/ability on which a section focuses. This makes the book a cohesive whole despite the diversity of the women and the stories featured.

The book has some errors: for example, at one point in Stephanie Plymale’s story, it is given “They have now been married for over 35 years” and at another, “… has been married to her high school sweetheart for 30 years.” Such errors could have been avoided had the book been proofread well.

I like stories of second chances, of empowerment, of success after years of failure and disappointment. My life story can be summarized as ‘She got back up after each fall, however severe the injuries were.’ So, it was only natural that I liked Tell Her She Can’t.

Note:

I received an advance review copy from BookSirens in exchange for an honest review.

How to Take Smart Notes

Blurb:
The key to good and efficient writing lies in the intelligent organisation of ideas and notes. This book helps students, academics and nonfiction writers to get more done, write intelligent texts and learn for the long run. It teaches you how to take smart notes and ensure they bring you and your projects forward.
The Take Smart Notes principle is based on established psychological insight and draws from a tried and tested note-taking-technique. This is the first comprehensive guide and description of this system in English, and not only does it explain how it works, but also why. It suits students and academics in the social sciences and humanities, nonfiction writers and others who are in the business of reading, thinking and writing.
Instead of wasting your time searching for notes, quotes or references, you can focus on what really counts: thinking, understanding and developing new ideas in writing. It does not matter if you prefer taking notes with pen and paper or on a computer, be it Windows, Mac or Linux. And you can start right away.

Thoughts:
Sönke Ahrens, a professor in systematic education at Hamburg University, has based this book on the remarkable note-taking system of the revered sociology professor Niklas Luhmann.
Luhmann wrote and organized over 90,000 index cards to support his 30-year-project ‘A Theory of Society’. His unique note-taking system, based on the Zettelkasten or slip-box method, helped him to write around 60 books and hundreds of articles on a wide range of subjects.
The book is not fully focused on note-taking. It also discusses many psychological concepts, such as the mere-exposure effect, Miller's law, survivorship bias, Parkinson's law, the tunnel effect, etc.
While Ahrens has described the Zettelkasten method and why you should adopt it, the how in ‘How to Take Smart Notes’ is rather vague. Also, he has stopped using the software mentioned in the book and has switched to another.
I liked the book in that it introduced me to Zettelkasten. I love the idea because it appeals to my systematic, organized side. However, the lack of illustrative examples makes the writing stiff and the book difficult to finish.
I read the first few chapters and liked and understood the method. I was disappointed that there were no examples to illustrate its actual implementation.

Happy 95% of the Time

Blurb:

In his latest book, Dr. Walter Doyle Staples invites his readers to experience life as fully aware, fully conscious, and fully functioning individuals. Staples presents powerful and life-changing ideas and concepts on how to transcend our ego-based state of consciousness to achieve deep peace, profound love, and infinite joy.

Happy 95% of the Time explains how our attachment to our egos can only create dysfunction and suffering in our lives, resulting in fear, anger, guilt, regret, depression, and/or despair. Staples contends we need to awaken to a new consciousness and experience a new beginning.

Happy 95% of the Time describes in detail the three primary ways to overcome low self-esteem, stress, anxiety, and depression:

· Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)—an example of Western, left-brain analytical thinking
· Practical spirituality—an example of Eastern, right-brain mystical thinking
· Mindfulness meditation—an inner-body, contemplative approach designed to manage our internal thought processes in order to calm the mind

Numerous world-renowned authorities on personal success—from Jack Canfield, Ken Blanchard, and Dr. Norman Vincent Peale to Art Linkletter, Anthony Robbins, and Brian Tracy—have praised Staples’s previous books. We are sure they—and you—will find Happy 95% of the Time just as valuable and compelling.

Thoughts:
In this book, Staples explains complex concepts, such as Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Mindfulness Meditation and Practical Spirituality in simple, clear ways. There are some practicable steps to counter depression but most of it is quite theoretical.
Staples also repeats himself quite often and in a long-winded manner. Maybe the fact that I have read extensively about the three concepts and expected a novel approach did not help.
To summarize, this was not the book I expected it to be. However, it had some noteworthy quotes in it, such as the following: 

Look around you.
How much confusion do you see in nature?
Do not seeds sprout? Do not flowers blossom? Do not rivers flow?
Do not birds sing? Does not the wind blow? Does not the rain fall?
This can only be described as pure perfection, and it abounds everywhere on earth.
This begs the question:
What can you learn from nature to make your own life more perfect, more meaningful, more profound?

Ditches to Riches

Blurb:

Your dreams may be free, but getting there demands a price.

Homeless. Addicted. Alone. Ronald Worley hit rock bottom, but climbed his way back and into money, a successful business, and fulfillment. Now he is helping others do the same.

Negative circumstances can overshadow a life of purpose. Making the brave hard choices can seem impossible. Yet, you don’t have to accept mediocrity. Your growth is your choice. If trauma and failure have set you adrift, it’s time to step up with Ditches to Riches.

Unlock potent strategies to revolutionize your well-being, create personal wealth, and build a prosperous business! Worley’s inspiring true success story teaches you to overcome feeling defeated, directionless, and driven to the edge. Give yourself the chance you deserve. 

Discover:

The Worley Way: commit to your personal bravery and take purposeful risk that could be your path to the business you’ve always wanted.

How to remove the cuffs of painful emotions, to conquer fears, biases, and irrationalities.

The value system to apply to your personal and professional life so you can rise to success, no matter where you start.

Which tools and deliberate daily habits help you create your purpose and stop destructive cycles.

How to unbox your own true story of vulnerability, grit, and personal ethics for a life filled with long-term success, wealth, and exceptional relationships.

You need to show up and make the right choices to make your dreams happen. Follow heartening real-life stories to help you ditch a shattered life and build a new rich one. These are life lessons for the new entrepreneur, strategic-thinker, or anyone sick of not using their full hidden potential. 

Thoughts:

I chose this book because I thought it was the autobiography of a man who climbed all the way from ditches to riches. I was mistaken. 

The book does not give you a chronological account of Worley’s journey. While he is frank about the obstacles he faced, such as addiction and homelessness, he does not describe how exactly he did this and when. 

He tells you that he overcame all those and became successful in his personal and professional life. He and his mentor, Arron Chambers, thought that he could help people by way of business if he connected his stories to business. So, he elaborates on 10 values that constitute what he calls the Worley Way. He tries to explain what they are and how they helped him. 

The result is a strangely structured book. This is because his life events are not mentioned sequentially and are haphazardly mentioned to explain his values. In some chapters, he talks disparagingly of his parents and siblings, while in others he seems quite proud of them. 

His advice and recommendations are good but not exceptional. As in almost every book of the self-help genre, there is a lot of repetition and pontificating. 

Overall, an okay book. 

Note: I received a free advance review copy from BookSirens, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

 

Blurb:

In this generation-defining self-help guide, a superstar blogger cuts through the crap to show us how to stop trying to be "positive" all the time so that we can truly become better, happier people.

For decades, we’ve been told that positive thinking is the key to a happy, rich life. "F**k positivity," Mark Manson says. "Let’s be honest, shit is f**ked and we have to live with it." In his wildly popular Internet blog, Manson doesn’t sugarcoat or equivocate. He tells it like it is—a dose of raw, refreshing, honest truth that is sorely lacking today. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is his antidote to the coddling, let’s-all-feel-good mindset that has infected American society and spoiled a generation, rewarding them with gold medals just for showing up.

Manson makes the argument, backed both by academic research and well-timed poop jokes, that improving our lives hinges not on our ability to turn lemons into lemonade, but on learning to stomach lemons better. Human beings are flawed and limited—"not everybody can be extraordinary, there are winners and losers in society, and some of it is not fair or your fault." Manson advises us to get to know our limitations and accept them. Once we embrace our fears, faults, and uncertainties, once we stop running and avoiding and start confronting painful truths, we can begin to find the courage, perseverance, honesty, responsibility, curiosity, and forgiveness we seek.

There are only so many things we can give a f**k about so we need to figure out which ones really matter, Manson makes clear. While money is nice, caring about what you do with your life is better, because true wealth is about experience. A much-needed grab-you-by-the-shoulders-and-look-you-in-the-eye moment of real-talk, filled with entertaining stories and profane, ruthless humor, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F**k is a refreshing slap for a generation to help them lead contented, grounded lives. 

Thoughts:

I started reading this book because of the title. I kept on as it has a few interesting points. 

The book tells you to get your priorities straight and base your decisions on them. It says that you aren’t special because you or your problems aren’t as unique as you think. It encourages you to choose to be responsible for the wins and losses in your life. 

Today, you are under constant pressure to focus on positivity, which only serves to make you more aware of what is wrong in your life. Manson advises you to focus only on the important, urgent, true things. 

I can relate to these points. When I was much younger, I was the kind of person who gave one too many f**ks about life. I often despaired of myself for not being able to be indifferent and blasé about many things. 

I had my first stroke when I was 21. It left me partially paralyzed. I was eventually diagnosed with multiple sclerosis (MS). From then on, life has presented me with so many challenges. My choices/decisions are heavily influenced by my illness. I thoughtfully choose what to give a f**k about. 

Manson does not claim that all the ideas in the book are his own, which is just as well because they are based on Eastern philosophy, stoicism, and existentialism. 

The book has one too many swear words but then what else can you expect with a title like that? Manson is also slightly off when he discusses women, victims of abuse, love, and relationships. This makes the second half weak and less interesting. 

To sum up, an easy-to-read book because of the conversational tone and reasonable advice.

First Real Decade

Blurb:
What to do in your twenties instead of "hustling" and making money?
It's not an easy question to answer.
As a twenty-year-old struggling to understand what to do with his life, the top Medium writer and author Sergey Faldin bought in the hustle myth. He dropped out of college. Started businesses. Traded bitcoin. Was in debt. Then, one day, he said, “Enough”, packed his bags and moved to London, leaving his former life behind.
Insightful and motivating, The First Real Decade is part memoir, part self-help, part much-needed wake-up call for every twenty-year-old about what really matters: patience, self-exploration, focus on the long-term.
“There was never an old person in all human history, who said on their deathbed, ‘I didn’t have enough time to make more money because I studied, explored or was too patient in my twenties.”
If you are twenty-something and fed up with feeling inadequate, FOMO-driven, and as if life is moving too fast, this book is for you. 

Thoughts:
This book is a collection of Sergey's essays, some of which have been published on Medium and some not, are given in each part. Through them, he shares his views on his life and life in general. Sergey also writes about many thought leaders, their opinions, and explains his responses to them.
The underlying premise is that perhaps your twenties, or the first real decade as Sergey calls it, is not the best time to be productive; it is the time to explore. This is a great point.
However, I wish the book was better structured and edited and was less repetitive. There are not many interesting personal anecdotes to provide relief, probably because he has not yet lived that long! I wonder if Sergey should have waited a few years more years to write this book.

Note: I was given a free copy by Sergey in exchange for an honest review.

How to Choose the Ultimate Side-Hustle

How to Choose the Ultimate Side-Hustle: Making Money and Being Your Own Boss by Kristine Hudson makes you scrutinize your idea of a side hustle. It also has useful, detailed, well-organized, practical information on how to do so.

The book does not have much on ‘how to choose’. However, it does away with the need to read many articles as it has a long list of resources at the end to help you.

Although the title does not indicate it, the book seems to be for women. This is rather unnecessary as the tips given in it do not have anything to do with gender. Also, why is the term ‘side hustle’ hyphenated?!

That said, overall a good book if you are thinking of starting a side hustle.

Note: I received a free copy from BookSirens in exchange for an honest review.

Zen Miracles: Finding Peace in an Insane World

by Dr. Brenda Shoshanna

In the book Zen Miracles: Finding Peace in an Insane World, Dr. Shoshanna uses her own experiences with Zen to explain its common concepts and principles. Sometimes the writing is quite subjective; however, it is enjoyable even for someone not familiar with Zen.

I don’t understand many of the koans in it but they say it takes a lifetime to understand some, or sometimes, you don’t understand them at all.

I leave you with the Zen Miracle Commandments at the end of the book. Brenda asks the readers to keep them as companions and enjoy living with them.

• Do not lean on others. Do not lean on anything.
• Keep your back straight at all times. Your spine connects heaven and earth. Honor it.
• Loneliness is an unwillingness to communicate freely with all of creation. Remedy this.
• Do not puff yourself up and put others down. We are all treading on the same earth.
• This particular breath will not come again. Pay attention to it.
• We cannot stop the noise, but we can stop ourselves. We can accept the noise.
• What you are at this moment contains the whole message of what you were.
• You can never see anything worse than yourself.
• Place after place is the right place.
• Don’t put a head on your own head. What’s wrong with your own?
• Going somewhere doesn’t take you anywhere else.
• Doing nothing is more than enough. Flowers grow on their own.

The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari

by Robin S. Sharma

This is the story of Julian Mantle, a lawyer whose life drastically changes after a major heart attack. He is forced to face the spiritual crisis in his out-of-balance life. He travels to India where he hears of the Sages of Sivana and tries to trace them. He finds them in the Himalayas. During his stay with them, they teach him a step-by-step approach to living with greater courage, balance, abundance and joy through a story.

He comes back rejuvenated and shares the story with his friend John.

The story starts in a beautiful garden with a lighthouse in the middle. Out of the lighthouse walks a 9 foot tall, 900-pound Sumo wrestler who wears only a pink wire cable covering his privates. He slips and falls on a stopwatch on the floor and loses consciousness. However, he wakes up to the fresh fragrance of yellow roses. He looks over and discovers a path studded with diamonds, through which he goes away.

So the story progresses through the elements garden, lighthouse, Sumo wrestler, pink wire cable, stopwatch, roses, and path of diamonds. Each of these elements symbolizes virtues, which are also explained in detail with techniques on how to practice them etc.

Symbol: Garden (Your mind); Virtue: Master your mind

Symbol: Lighthouse (Purpose of your life); Virtue: Follow your purpose

Symbol: Sumo Wrestler (Kaizen, meaning constant improvement of oneself. It signifies pushing the boundaries to develop mind, body and spirit in spite of fear, adversity and discomfort.); Virtue: Practice Kaizen

Symbol: Pink wire (Discipline); Virtue: Live with discipline

Symbol: Golden stopwatch (Mastery over time); Virtue: Value your time

Symbol: Sweet yellow roses (Service); Virtue: Serve others selflessly

 Symbol: Path of Diamonds; Virtue: Embrace the Present

The funny thing is that until I started reading it, I did not realize that I had read it before. It is not that forgettable. Maybe, it was just not the right time then!

Initially, I had read an e-book version and maybe that is why I did not enjoy it as much. I like to hold and feel the books I read. This time, it was a paperback version.

1. The book’s back cover says that “this inspiring tale provides a step-by-step approach to living with greater courage, balance, abundance, and joy.”

Inspiring? Yes.

Step-by-step? No. Slightly disorganized.

2. It also says: “On a life-changing odyssey to an ancient culture, he discovers powerful, wise, and practical lessons that teach us to:

• Develop joyful thoughts,
• Follow our life’s mission and calling,
• Cultivate self-discipline and act courageously,
• Value time as our most important commodity,
• Nourish our relationships, and
• Live fully, one day at a time.”

All the above? Yes.

Unique lessons? I don’t think so. They are from old Hindu and Buddhist philosophies and practices.